High arsenic and thallium in urine - concerned

Were these 24 hour urine samples or just spot urine samples? 24 hour testing is the gold standard. Sot testing is less reliable. From what you described, it sounds like spot testing

Re: thallium, Levels under 5 rarely cause harm despite being over the normal limit. Levels greater than 500 signal poisoning. Levels > 1000 are life threatening.

So your levels seem borderline to me ( I’m not a toxicologist). Do u have any symptoms? GI distress, nerve pain, hair loss (above and beyond male pattern baldness, if you’re a man), poor kidney function? What lead you to have the test performed? What do you do for a living? Occupational exposure is one way to end up with elevated levels of. Do you smoke? Smoking can lead to low levels like yours. Recreational drug use places you in a risk group to get low or high levels.

Given that your results are borderline normal imho, I would have them rechecked with a 24 hour sample. Another route would be checking blood or hair or nails.

Regarding your arsenic levels. Did they by chance speciate the sample to distinguish toxic inorganic forms from harmless forms found in seafood. Once speciated, toxic levels > 50 warrent further testing. Despite your seafood fast, I would still recommend having the sample speciated. If this cannot be done I would repeat a 24 hour test. The number 36 as the high normal is different from my reading “normal total urine arsenic is generally 20-50mg/liter in unexposed people avoiding seafood for 48-62 hours. Levels of 50-100 are borderline and often diet related. Inorganic arsenic (the concern after speciation) should be less than 35; in their view one should fast from seafood for 48-72 hours. Perhaps on 24 hour sample fast from seafood for the full 72 hours plus during the 24 hour testing.

The real question in my mind is do you have elevated levels or are these artifacts of testing. I’n additional to getting 24 hour testing (you only need to do this for thallium and arsenic, this should decrease cost somewhat) Did you choose a lab that is known to perform many of these tests and pays scrupulous attention to detail? I think one way to discern this is to wait or call to see if speciation of thallium is done reflexively (without your asking for it). You could also look for reviews online, etc. also, lab should be certified by CLIA (compliance with federal standards) and CAP ( gold standard for proficiency)

Avoid non certified direct to consumer kits lacking oversight.

I hope this gets you started on the correct path. Let us know the 24 hour results.

Might I ask again what lead you to have there metals checked? Is insurance paying part or are u paying out of pocket? How much did it cost?

Good luck,

Laura

I noticed in your attachment that the samples were validated via CLIA guidelines , CAP not mentioned.

You mentioned you don’t know where thallium might come from. One source is fruit and vegetables grown in thallium rich soil. Also cigarette smoke and certain occupations most common

I don’t think you have to give up brown rice while waiting on 24 hour testing. Simply give it a good washing and let it soak for a few hours

One interesting thing about arsenic exposure, one can develop single or double white stripes with chronic exposure. I will try to find a pic.

Hey, thanks for your help, I'll answer your queries in order.

Spot urine.

I should clarify, the units here are mcg/g creat (i.e. creatinine), instead of mcg/L (not creatinine). I didn't get a mcg/L measurement, and don't know how to translate mcg/g creatinine to mcg/L.

For mcg/g creatinine, apparently the typical ranges are considered anywhere from below 0.4 mcg/g creat to below 2 mcg/g as normal, whereas 8 mcg/g is significantly elevated.

At the end of the week of the weird head symptoms etc I had some manageable pain in the morning in my lower-right abdomen (felt like near bowels), which felt like bloating. For the next few days there was just very mild pain there which I sometimes wondered was muscle-related instead due to its appearance on certain movements. It was gone after a few days. No upper GI pain.

No nerve pain besides the intermittent tingling left toe (not painful, just mild pins/needles) on stepping (not constant) for several days (gone now) which I thought may have been due to hitting it slightly too hard while running without my special blister resist socks one day.

No hair loss. This test was 10 days ago.

Kidney function - not sure, but seems fine. A comprehensive blood test 1.5 weeks prior to the urine sample didn't indicate any kidney abnormalities.

What led me to get the test were (1) the strange symptoms I mentioned in my post, (2) I had been eating brown rice almost daily for over a year so wanted to check arsenic, (3) mercury blood level was above limit at 15 mcg/L on the comprehensive test so I wanted to track if dropping tuna worked (surprisingly, in the urine sample just 1.5 weeks past the blood test, mercury was undetected, coming back "below reportable range" of 4 mcg/L).

I don't work in an occupation known for high thallium exposure.

I don't smoke and try hard to avoid secondhand smoke. I wear an N95 + OV relief mask walking outside in my city which has a lot of smokers. I don't recall running into (odorous) secondhand smoke the day of the urine test, don't remember seeing any smokers near me.

I don't currently use recreational drugs.

I'll go through my PCP and ask for a retest for thallium and possibly arsenic. I heard 24h urine is the most reliable.

Re the arsenic ranges you listed, again the units on mine were mcg/g creat (creatinine). From what I read, 46 mcg/g creat is elevated, with levels higher than 12 mcg/g creat associated with increased risk of conditions, and levels higher than 30 mcg/g tyically indicating monomethylarsonate/MMA (toxic metabolite) is high enough to cause genotoxicity (damage to DNA).

The problem is the urine test doesn't seem to distinguish between organic (less harmful) and inorganic arsenic. I ate fish 3 days prior to the urine test, and seaweed just past 48h prior, which may be high in organic arsenic. I guess I should hold off seafood for longer to retest.

I'm also wondering if these samples were contaminated, especially the thallium which has no clear explanation at all.

I used Quest Diagnostics for this test. No idea on their reputation for testing heavy metals. But even if they're certified I guess contamination is a possibility. Need to retest to be sure.

This was a self-pay test ($185) so insurance didn't pay, but for subsequent testing I'll go through my PCP so insurance can cover.

I do eat frozen fruit almost daily (typically Whole Foods 365 organic wild blueberries, and Pitaya Immunity Fruit which has organic mangos, dragon fruit and passion fruit).

The brown rice I usually ate was pre-cooked microwavable. It'll be easier for me to switch to something else.

I don't see any clear white stripes on my fingernails, just a few small white dots on a few which I understand is normal.

Thanks again for your help!

The difference in the units is because one was a spot urine as one a 24 hour urine. I don’t think you can translate. You also might find slightly different normal ranges for the same reason.

Regarding the test not differentiating between inorganic and organic. This requires speciation testing. Perhaps this is only done on 24 hour samples. You could call the lab and ask them.

A good way to know if a lab is a good one is to note if they do reflex speciation. Again , it may be that this is only possible on a 24 hour sample.

The way I read your tests, it’s possible this is all artifact as you did a spot urine. A 24 hour test is the “gold standard “. Get hat test done and seee where u stand. Avoid seafood for a full 72 hours for the best results.

@laura1970 As a pescetarian since earlier this year I'd been eating seafood almost daily so plan to not eat seafood for at least a week or so for the retest.

I just know that especially leafy greens rapidly absorb thallium from the soil, especially if the soil is contaminated with thallium, usually from coal burning, smelting, or mining sites. When buying from a grocery store I am not sure how one would know where the food was grown. Do you know?

Before I moved a year ago I bought all my produce, eggs and chicken from a Mennonite co-op that had been in the same location a long time- generations, I believe. This conversation has me wondering if I could find a similar situation here, I moved from a small town with a large Mennonite community about an hour west. Those particular Mennonite’s, I had heard, didn’t have their farms categorized as organic because of the paperwork and red tape involved. But , again this is just what most of us in town believed, there farms went well beyond what was required for the designation. They didn’t use pesticides for the most part, etc. their eggs weren’t categorized as free range, yet the chickens mostly roamed freely. That kind of thing. Now I live in suburbia, surrounded by 2 large cities and 1 small one. This conversation makes me wonder where my food is coming from, know what I mean?